Editorial Reviews

The Broadway musical Sweet Charity did not undergo the kind of drastic revision in its adaptation to the screen suffered by some shows, but it was revised by the same creative team that had brought it to the stage. Four songs -- "You Should See Yourself," "Too Many Tomorrows," "I'm the Bravest Individual," and "Baby Dream Your Dream" -- were deleted, and replaced with the two newly written ones -- "My Personal Property" and "It's a Nice Face" -- and the title song was given a new melody. The resulting soundtrack album was, as a result, substantially shorter than the Original Broadway Cast album, and far less complete. Far more problematic, the outstanding Gwen Verdon, for whom the show was created, was replaced on-screen by the only adequate, but supposedly bankable Shirley MacLaine. And, although Sammy Davis, Jr. had only one scene, in which he sang the gospel-tinged "the Rhythm of Life" (accounting for less than ten percent of the soundtrack's running time), in true Hollywood fashion he was given equal star billing with MacLaine. Caught in the late-'60s backlash against big-budget movie musicals, Sweet Charity was a bomb at the box office, though it has come to be a cult favorite because it shows off choreography by director Bob Fosse. The soundtrack album is vastly inferior to the Original Broadway Cast album, but fans of songwriters Cy Coleman and Dorothy Fields will want to hear the new songs. William Ruhlmann, All Music Guide

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